


The Tithe

by Happy_Cow



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Based On A Short Story, Dark Reylo, F/M, Grooming, Minor Finn/Rose Tico, Minor Poe Dameron/Finn, Older Man/Younger Woman, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Multiple, Slow Build, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-16 00:48:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29198628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Happy_Cow/pseuds/Happy_Cow
Summary: When Rey visits her friend's house to deliver late homework, a secret world is opened up to her. Yet for all of its magic, it is not the gift that she is lead to believe it is...
Relationships: Finn/Rose Tico, Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 24
Kudos: 47





	1. Rey Visits a Dear Friend

**Author's Note:**

> Based on The Summer People, by Kelly Link!  
> v nice short story :3
> 
> i want winter 2 b over now ;-;

In the cold, still air, a bell rings. The birds go silent, and the squirrels in their nests go still. The ringing of the bell seeps deep into the soil, waking what laid dormant until this moment. A seed opens, extending roots beneath it. Its head breaks through the surface, and once it sheds its seed coat, its first leaves feel the touch of sunlight. The bell is for that seed and for the naked trees huddled against the winter wind like paupers, and in lesser part it is for those birds and squirrels that have survived the killing frost. 

The bell is not for you, nor I. It is the most beautiful sound, but it was not made for our ears. If you should hear it, it will come to you when you are outdoors, walking alone by the woods in early February. It will stop you in your tracks; it will sound like nothing you have heard in your life. You will look around for the source of the ringing and find that all is silent, after. If you should hear it, you are cursed. 

* * *

When Rey came to Finn’s house, the only thing she had intended on saving was Finn’s grade point average, so he wouldn’t have to repeat the eleventh grade. Make no mistake, Finn was _smarter_ than her. _He_ helped _her_ with homework. But with this current bout of illness, he had missed so much class that most of the teachers had already written him off as a drop-out. Only Rey knew better.

Finn lived in a sagging prefab house at the end of its street, right at the edge of the forest which bordered the highway. The lawn was overgrown, the tall grass littered with stray odds and ends of machinery. She had always _wondered_ what Finn was doing with all the junk he asked her for. 

Rey opened the storm door and rapped her knuckles on the front door. Then she hefted her old backpack up her shoulders. There were two weeks worth of AP homeworks in there. Footsteps sounded from inside, and who should open the door, but Rose Tico?

Rose Tico was the _other_ girl who Finn was friends with. Another outcast who wore secondhand clothes and couldn’t find the time to comb her hair in the morning. Except, Rose’s hair was black where Rey’s was brown, and Rose wore her hair in a messy ponytail instead of a bun. Rose had a rounder face and dark, almost _menacing_ eyes. Nobody messed with her; and since her sister disappeared last year, the other kids joked that one day she would bring a gun to school.

Rey and Rose stared at each other, both equally shocked. It was Rose who recovered first; her hand shot out, and in a second, Rey stumbled into the house. What Rey noticed first was the overwhelming scent of mothballs. Everything, from the living room furniture and the wallpaper, was pure white, the shade of enamel teeth.

Rose rubbed her face, but bags still ringed her eyes. _What’re you doing here?_ they demanded of each other. Rey had the easier explanation; Rose did not or could not answer straight away. Instead, Rose lead her to a pure white bedroom, where Finn laid in dead sleep, like a cursed prince. It was a horrible house, like a mausoleum. That and the lack of forthcoming answers from Rose began to terrify Rey.

An idea occurred to Rose; she pulled a notepad out of Rey’s backpack. “Is he alright?” asked Rey. She clutched Finn’s hand, which was cold to the touch. “Do — should we call the hospital?”

“He’s fine,” Rose muttered impatiently. She had found a pencil and she was writing down instructions rapidly on a page. “If you want to help him, you need to do something for him.”

“Do what?” Rey asked. She felt like she was stuck in some kind of incomprehensible nightmare. Finn looked dead to her, and Rose was hiding something. Rose stood up and handed her the list. Rey looked down at it, and read it for all of thirty seconds. _Maybe Rose is sick, too,_ Rey thought in horror. “I don’t — I don’t understand,” Rey choked out.

“You don’t _have_ to understand,” Rose answered. 

At this point, Rey tried to leave, but Rose stepped in front of her, blocking the exit. “Rey, this is something that only _you_ can do,” she said. “I. I don’t have time to explain it now, because I don’t think you’d believe me, but just know that this is the _only_ thing that’s going to help Finn right now.”

Rey looked down at the hastily scribbled instructions, and she looked back at the body of her friend, lying in that bed. _This is crazy,_ she thought. Rose _had_ to be crazy, but she sounded so certain. Even if this sounded batshit crazy, Rey would do _anything_ in her power to help Finn. And if this didn’t work, she could call an ambulance anyway, and maybe they could get some psychological help for Rose.

Just then, Rose grabbed her shoulder with her vice-like grip. When Rey tried to pull away, those fingers tightened. “Do you want to save his life?” asked Rose. A light flashed in those dark eyes, wild with desperation.

At the end of the street, where the road came to a stop, there was a dirt footpath that lead down into the woods. Down and down it went, until it dipped into the ravine just parallel to the highway. The afternoon light glanced harshly through the tangle of branches. The highway roared in her ears like the breathing of an enormous monster.

At the end of the pathway there was a house. Not the kitschy prefabricated kind like everybody else’s, but an old, two-story log cabin, with a porch. No mailbox and no numbered address marked the property. Rey made sure to stay on the path, to go between the two dead willow trees, like the instructions read. Her ears began to ring at this point; terrified, she wiggled her pinky finger in her ears to try to clear them. It was probably just her nerves.

Rey looked at that house and hefted her backpack up her shoulders. She was frozen in place. She looked at the instructions and looked back at the two dead willow trees, and then she looked at the darkened, musty windows of the cabin in front of her. She reached into one of the front pockets of her backpack to retrieve her cell — she _needed_ to ask Rose if she was _sure_ nobody would answer the door and that she wouldn’t be shot for trespassing. But the phone registered no signal. Gulping, Rey shoved the phone into her jeans front pocket. Either she did this, or she turned around.

Rey hopped up the porch steps. She knocked on the front door for courtesy’s sake — the instructions didn’t say anything about not knocking. “ _Hello_?” she called out weakly. She glanced at one of the side windows and noticed the glass was broken in one of the corners. Inside, only darkness. She shivered. 

_Step inside_ , the instructions read. Rey gripped the copper handle, and to her horror, it twisted and opened the door with a clicking sound. As she pushed it open, the door swung back with a long groan. Inside, the edges of things were limned with an afternoon light, which was fading, fast. Rey stepped inside and she called out again. She prayed that whoever lived in this house didn’t mind the intrusion, or wasn’t lying in wait to ambush her. 

Rey peeled open the instructions and held them close to her face. After entering the house, the list read, 

_Don’t touch anything — Go upstairs_. 

Rey glanced around the living room; despite the hole in the front window, the living room was warm. The air inside actually smelled like pine needles, and not the chemical air-freshener kinds that hung over car dashboards. Rey found a wooden staircase. Each step groaned beneath her weight, so she conveniently found no reason to call out anymore. Unless they were deaf, if there were anybody in this cabin, they would have known she was there by now, Rey thought. 

The stairs lead to a narrow corridor, with a window at the end. On each side were three wooden doors. Rey looked at the list again. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end; she glanced around to check if anybody was watching her.

_Leave offering_ , 

Rey looked down the corridor dubiously. She checked the instructions again. Rey’s hand fluttered to the cell phone jammed in her pocket, when she remembered the loss of the cell signal. Rose did warn her that that wouldn’t work, and not to bother. It was one of the few things Rose _did_ tell her. It did not inspire confidence.

Rey looked at the six doors. Each were made of hardwood, with a copper or brass knob. At the bottom of each knob, there was a wide keyhole, the kind that Rey had only seen on television shows. She chose a door at random, and Rey crouched beneath the weight of the backpack and looked inside. 

A soft giggling sound touched her ears. Rey leaned back, for fear of someone seeing her. When she peered inside again, she saw the back of an armchair, with light flashing in front of it. The giggling came again, and then a muffled hushing sound. It was a television; somebody was watching television inside. 

Rey leaned back. “Hello?” she called. The corridor magnified her voice, and made it sound like she was standing next to herself, talking to herself. She slid the backpack to the floor. “Um... I’m here, because, because my friend is in trouble,” she said. She grabbed the zipper and pulled it open. Rose had replaced all the contents. “I was told that you could help him, in exchange for this stuff,” Rey said. 

Carefully, she pulled out each piece: a long piece of an inkjet printer, a small rice cooker, a roll of insulated wiring. She placed these in front of the door with the television inside, and then strapped the deflated bag back over her shoulders.

Rey was beginning to feel foolish, that maybe Rose pulled a fast one on her. Everybody in school said she went _strange_ after her sister Paige disappeared. Rey looked at the other doors. She went to another one, and bent down to peer into the keyhole. The room inside was completely dark, but she could make out vague shapes of furniture. Then the sharp smell of copper touched her nose and she recoiled from it. Weird.

She wasn’t sure how long she’d been here, but the light from the window still shone bright. She stood at the end of the hall now, and she still hadn’t met the people who lived in this cabin. The last of the instructions told her to take something from the bottom of the staircase and leave. Steps were missing.

She chose a third door, one at the end of the hall, and peered inside the keyhole. A pale shape moved in the dark. When her eyes adjusted, she could make out the planes of a man’s back. Muscles in his back stretched, and then strands of dark hair escaped his towel and fell over his shoulders. Her mouth went dry and she drew a sharp breath. He turned. Rey squealed and leaned away from the door. Her face burned hot. When she blinked, she could still see that _body_. 

“H-hello?” she murmured, her tone grown husky. “I’m... I’m sorry...” Her hand grazed the doorknob, just as she kept herself from turning it. For no logical reason, she was struck with the distinct sense that _this_ door would open for her, and she wasn’t prepared for that to happen. Instead, she bent over and placed her eye by the keyhole, unsure of what she had seen.

Dark inside. Rey squinted, wondering if she had just imagined it. Maybe, again, it was an illusion, like the television. Maybe she had seen a poster, or a picture, or a statue — and the light hit it in a way to make it look real.

A breeze tickled her ear, and made a sound like a breath exhaling. An eye appeared in the keyhole. 

Rey yelped and fell backwards. She scrambled to her feet, and then shot downstairs, nearly tripping over a small bottle at the center of the landing. The floor above creaked. Rey snatched that bottle and bolted outside, and in her escape, her phone slipped, unnoticed, from her front pocket.

Past the two dead willows, the sky turned black. Rey stumbled blindly up the path. The highway roared in her ears like a monster.

Rose opened the door for her, and only then did Rey get a good look at her prize. In her fist, she held a glass bottle with a rubber dropper in it, filled with a dark liquid. Around the handle of the dropper there was a little rope, with a paper gift tag that read _Drink me_. When Rose saw it, she scooped Rey in a bear hug, before snatching the bottle. They went into the bedroom, where Rose dripped some of the liquid into Finn’s mouth. 

His eyes opened. 

  
  



	2. An Unhappy Reunion between Friends; Rey receives a Gift

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> henlo; a v short chapter :>   
> I m trying to finish 3 different stories, but thank u for readin c:

Rey only caught up with Rose _after_ school the next day. Since last night until the school bell rang, Rey felt like she was going to _explode_ with all of her questions. But she might as well have walked all the way by herself — Rose pressed her lips tight and ignored her the entire time. The only moment she did react was when Rey tried to go down the dirt path past the road.

“ _What are you doing?_ ” Rose’s voice blasted out as if she were holding a megaphone. The look she gave Rey could’ve frozen water over.

Despite the cold, sweat broke out in Rey’s armpits. She pointed down the path; she sincerely hoped that her phone was inside that strange cabin. But in that moment, she could imagine exactly _how much_ Rose would like that answer. 

“Finn doesn’t live down there,” Rose deadpanned. “He lives _here_.” Rose stood at the doorstep of Finn’s house. She took out a key and unlocked the door, before flourishing with her hand. Head down, Rey rushed inside of the house.

They wandered into that house unannounced, like transients stealing into a museum. They found Finn sitting in a formal dining room, sitting at the end of a long hardwood table, like in a Victorian drama. Finn beamed at Rey as she entered and they hugged.

After seeing the house, Rey was almost surprised that she didn’t find Finn in a waistcoat and dress shirt, or a top hat, but no — he was wearing a jersey and sweatpants. His hands were warm when they gripped her shoulder, and his face was its healthy, dark color. His eyes almost glittered. He broke off the hug and rubbed his hands together. “Now that _you two_ are here, you can turn in my homework for me,” he said.

“What?” exclaimed Rey, confused. Behind her, Rose recoiled as if his words were a physical blow. “You mean you’re still not coming tomorrow?”

Finn blinked quickly, and he shoved his hands inside the pockets of his sweatpants. “I’m still not — I’m still not feeling _myself_ , Rey,” he said evasively. Then he grinned and said, “Thanks for having my back, Rey. I owe you one.”

“But what about the _medicine_ that I got for you?” 

A look flashed across Finn’s face. _Fear_. He shook his head quickly. Sweat beaded on his forehead. “I - I owe _you_ for that, Rey. Don’t do anymore.” Then he sidled over to the table. “Wait. I mean, if you _really_ want to help me, I got all my English done, so you can take _that_ to Miss Holdo. You can copy it, if you want.”

While Finn gathered some loose papers, Rey looked between Rose and Finn. Rose blew through her lips and appeared to sag beneath the weight of her backpack. “Finn,” she said. “Why don’t—.”

“ _No_ ,” snapped Finn. 

“ _Why don’t we just tell her_ ,” Rose bleated.

Finn shoved a packet of papers into Rey’s chest, the force making Rey stumble back a little. Rey didn’t move. 

Finn breathed sharply through his nose. “Rey, you can just walk out of here,” he said in a low voice, the voice of a negotiator. “You have enough on your plate. You have Plutt, and, well, me and Rose have our _own_ burden. So just walk out of here.” 

Rey shuddered at the mention of Plutt. In her eyes, Rose and Finn’s problem sounded like _criminal_ problems. Maybe all those things Rey delivered to that house were stolen goods that they needed fenced. Hell, Plutt used to send her to abandoned houses to rip out copper wiring. For all her selflessness, Rey didn’t want more of that trouble on her shoulders. She took the papers and wordlessly slid them into her backpack. She hugged Finn and when she left the house, she didn’t look back.

Finn heaved a sigh and fell back into his seat at the head of the table. His healthy façade dropped away; for what it was, he was drained of all his energy. 

Rose stalked up to him and folded her arms over her chest, observing him. “They’re going to kill you,” she said. Finn turned his face down to his Calculus homework, and he grabbed his pencil. Now he regretted dismissing Rey so fast. “They’re going to kill you,” said Rose.

“ _They’re not gonna kill me_ ,” snapped Finn, his head whipping up to look at her. “I’m still _useful_.”

“You know they’re punishing you,” she said.

“For _Poe_?”

“For Poe,” they said simultaneously. Rose’s mouth curled at the corners. “You know, he asked about you last night. About whether you were okay.”

Finn’s breath stuttered, and his grip around the pencil loosened. Then he recalled himself, and he shook his head. But _they_ , or their voices, flew into a pitch. A hive of wasps rattled inside of his brain and stung him from the inside, and their individual voices united into a deafening cry. _Traitor, traitor, traitor —._

A hand smoothed against his back, making him flinch. In his peripheral, he recognized Rose’s figure, and he sagged with relief. Phasma was gone. She wasn’t coming back; Finn wasn’t worth _that_. 

“We need _help_ ,” Rose whispered, mindful of _them_. “I think we can trust her; like you said, she _knows_ what we’re going through, and she has _access_ to what they _need_.”

If Finn had the strength, he could have argued. 

Rey left that house and found that she could breathe again. Her breath came out in misty gasps, like a dragon. Rey half-wished she never went to Finn’s house, if they were going to treat her like this. But then she remembered seeing Finn laying near-death on his bed, and then watching him wake up from that after a droplet of that medicine that she retrieved. Now she felt a touch of guilt at that last thought; no, she didn’t regret going to Finn’s house yesterday. She went to bed yesterday believing that miracles or _magic_ were real. 

With that thought in mind, Rey walked to the very end of the tarmac street and she hopped down onto the dirt pathway. She checked the forest floor just in case, her hopes slowly deflating. Optimistically, she believed that the door of the cabin would be open, so she could grab her phone and get out. If not, well, she would just knock. 

Rey walked past the two dead willows, when her ears began to ring again. She stopped to rub at them, before looking up at the cabin. The windows were dark; it looked the same as yesterday. Though she could’ve sworn that one was broken, wasn’t it? She walked up the porch, and then she stopped. Between where she stood and the front door sat a small wooden box. When she picked it up, she noticed what looked like vines printed at the corners — no, not printed. She could feel the tendrils carved into the surface of the box. She lifted the lid; nestled inside of the box was her phone, on a bedding as soft as satin. Rey grinned with astonishment. She set the box back down — they could keep it. It looked expensive.

“Thank you,” she called to the front door.

She hopped back down the porch steps, ready to run back home. Out of instinct, she stopped, and she spun on her heels. The cabin looked the same as it did — except in the upper window, where a shadow flickered. Rey blinked in surprise. “Thank you,” she called again, before running home.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some more v important plotstuff
> 
> if u make it through this gauntlet, the prize is a v pretty Kylo

At school the next day, Rose paired herself up with Rey in US History. Rey had been bristling for a week about what to do for this summative project now that Finn was gone, until Rose scooted her table next to hers and drew the eyes of the entire class. _Let’s go to your house this time_ , she said, grinning frightfully. ‘Frightfully’ because a smile looked so out of place on Rose’s face, that Rey didn’t have the courage to argue with her. Rose was always known to be sort of _dangerous_. Word had it that last time somebody tried to bother her, she brought a Taser to school and hid it in her backpack. This time, there was a sort of manic gleam in the whites of Rose’s eyes, which inspired fear in poor Rey. A fear which momentarily outweighed her anxiety over Unkar Plutt.

Rose paused at the sight of the wide and yellowing lawn in front of Rey’s house. A couple of cars sat outside, so at first glance you would think a large family lived on the property. But the cars changed regularly; Plutt scalped them for cheap off of Ebay, or found them on the side of the road with magic marker on the window that read ‘FOR SALE, PLEASE CALL…’ Rose stared at these but said nothing.

Rey unlocked the front door and called reedily into the house to check for any unwelcome company, before waving Rose inside. The front door opened to hardwood flooring scuffed with bootmarks. A box television set sat at the corner. Cardboard boxes of things sat everywhere on the floor. Rey threw herself onto the patched up sofa by the window and muttered dourly, “ _If anybody asks, you’re here for a group project_.” She had wanted to stay after school to work on the school computer for their presentation, but Rose ignored all of the grumbling. She wanted to see the way Rey lived, then so be it.

Rey swung her backpack to her lap and threw open the zipper. Meanwhile, Rose crouched down and lifted the lids off of some of the cardboard boxes, to peer inside. Weird. With each passing minute, Rey regretted ever agreeing to this. “What are you doing?” Rey demanded.

“What is all this?” Rose asked. She stood up and kicked the side of the box with her sneaker.

“Junk,” said Rey, a touch indignant. “Don’t kick it. It’s my – it’s my _foster father’s_ stuff.” Rarely did Rey need to tell anybody about Unkar, and it suited her fine that way. It actually turned her stomach to refer to Unkar as her _father_ , in any sense of the word. Her nose crinkled in distaste, and she plunged her hand into the depths of her backpack to check that her phone was still there. Inwardly, she sagged with relief.

“He fences this stuff, doesn’t he?”

Rey whipped her head up. Rose looked back at her, feigning innocence. “What about it?” said Rey. “It’s none of _your_ business.” She wasn’t defending Unkar, but it would be _inconvenient_ if the law came down on their heads.

“I’m not accusing you of anything,” said Rose, shaking her head. She sidled up to the sofa after all. “Like, do you help him and stuff?”

Rey shrugged, frowning. She wondered if Rose was wearing a wire, but then thought against it. What Plutt did was small-tier crime. If the police were concerned about this, then their priorities were seriously out of order. There were disappeared girls and gang hits out there. “I take things apart when they can’t be fixed,” she said awkwardly. “… Sometimes he forces me to look over the lemons outside and see what can be fixed up so it can be resold.”

“Wow.” Rose made an o with her mouth like she was impressed. “I just… I think it’s kind of _cool_.”

Rey blinked. Nobody had ever called her _cool_ before. The work itself wasn’t glamorous; sometimes the cars smelled like dried up vomit or they had stains in the trunk. These were ancient vehicles about ten or twenty years old; if they had collision-prevention systems or high-tech things like that, there was little she could do. She muttered _thanks_ , and pulled out her notebook this time. Rey wondered if Rose would like to see her _motorcycle_ in the back of the yard, but then chased the thought away.

Well. They finished the framework of the Powerpoint presentation on their assigned Cold War proxy battle, and pulled out notes on what they could put into each slide. As Rey suspected, it was a task better completed on a computer, but Rose provided all of the notes from class and offered to visit the library computers during lunch tomorrow. The presentation wouldn’t be so bad. Great.

Rose cast a look around the room again, and at the boxes. And she said, “You know, this stuff would go a _long_ way to helping Finn.”

“Junk,” Rey corrected her. Then she frowned, her hands tightening on the straps of her backpack. Curiosity nipped at her. “How?”

Rose’s mouth twisted to the side. “Me and Finn,” she began, “are involved in a sort of operation, like your foster-dad. We _fence_ things, too.” Rose’s voice hitched; now it was her turn to be uncomfortable. If Rey wasn’t burning with questions, she would have clapped her hands over her ears and said _None of my business_.

Rey could see that Rose was hesitating; light bled out from the windows. Any minute, Plutt could barge in and ask what the fuck were they doing. Against an anxiety that Rey couldn’t identify, she pulled out her phone. “After I left Finn’s house the other day - you don’t know this, but I went _there_ again.”

Anticipation prickled along her spine. She _needed_ to hear it again. Rey clicked the Music application on her phone. “I dropped my phone the first time I went inside, and when I came back, I found it again, but it was sitting outside in a wood box.” _Oh_ , remarked Rose, faintly. “ _This_ was saved on it,” Rey said eagerly, and she chose the song. Pressed the Play arrow. The image for the album cover was a black square. “I can’t even find it on the store, haha.”

The music poured out of the phone. It was still the loveliest sound that Rey had ever heard; it filled the room and transformed it into a dark woods. It filled Rey’s heart and head; the first time she heard it, she thought she would go floating away. But when she turned to Rose, the girl’s face was a ghastly shade of white. Rose had her hands clamped tight around her own ears, her face a rictus of fear. Rose caught her eye and her lips rapidly formed the words _Shut it off, shut it off_!

Alarmed, Rey touched the phone and stopped the song. A part of her kept thrumming, as if something inside of her had awakened and it continued to beat.

Reluctantly, the other girl lowered her hands from her ears. Her fingers trembled even in her lap, and Rose looked at the phone uneasily, as if it could deafen her. The first thing she said was, “That sounded like _music_ to you?”

Rey grimaced, and then she nodded her head, offended. If she didn’t witness Rose’s extreme reaction, she might have played the song again out of sheer spite, but something went beyond music preference and actually _scared_ poor Rose.

Rose’s mouth twisted to the side. “Did you play this for anybody else?” she asked, a slight tremble in her voice. When Rey shook her head, Rose seemed to sag a bit. “Don’t – don’t play that for anybody else. They can be pretty secretive.”

Rey wasn’t planning on doing that anyway. Plutt didn’t have an ear for music, and she didn’t have very many friends besides Finn and a few teachers. “What did it sound like to you?” Rey asked.

Rose opened and closed her mouth. “Do you remember what you brought Finn the first time?” she asked. “It was medicine, in a glass vial.” Rey nodded. “Do you know what would happen if _I_ drank it?” Rose asked, thrusting her chin out. “It would have dissolved my insides. It would have made me suffer for a minute, long and slow, before it kills me. Because it was meant for _Finn_ , and not _me_. They’re jealous with their gifts. Both sides are.”

Rey was silent. The room appeared to darken; rationally, Rey knew that night was coming, but the shadows that passed over her body felt like the weight of hands. She shivered and pulled her coat tighter, and she noticed Rose shake herself and cast a fitful glance out of the window.

“Rey,” said Rose. “I’ve never told anybody else about this. When my sister left, I thought I would be alone forever, until I met Finn. He means a _lot_ to me, Rey. If it wasn’t for him, I would _die_ with this secret, gladly. I hope you can understand. I hope, someday, you can forgive me.” Staring over her shoulder out of the darkening window, Rose told her a story of a war older than the human race.

There were two courts in this war older than the human tongue, both of which have collected a myriad of names: Seelie and Unseelie, Good and Evil, the Light and the Dark. To the beings in these courts, time was of no consequence, for they lived forever and held power over the balance of nature. Few things could harm them, save for the mere touch of iron, which caused them excruciating pain. When a sharpened piece breaks their skin, the injury might scar at best, or more likely won’t heal. In the span of millennia, human beings equated to mere pawns, more or less a useful animal. But the resistance to and the manipulation of iron fascinated them, and both courts saw an opportunity to gain an advantage in their war.

Rose’s jaw worked, as if she tasted something bitter. “That’s where Paige, and Finn, and I come in,” she said, her voice far off. 

In any other moment, Rey would have laughed her off. Called her crazy and slammed the door in her face. But the sky was unusually dark for this time of the year, and Rey’s body lay frozen to her side of the couch. Something felt wrapped around her own throat, so she couldn’t laugh if she wanted to. A shadow darted in the window outside; Rey saw the afterimage of lights, like eyes.

Rose spoke faintly, “I should get home.” She dragged herself off the couch, and shrugged her backpack on, to Rey’s incredulous eyes. “I think they’re going to be _mad_ with me,” she sighed.

A rush of anger spiked inside of Rey. After that short story, Rose expected her to believe, what, that _fairies_ were real? That Rose, her dead or disappeared sister, and Finn were all in some sort of conspiracy with _fairies_? And now Rey knew this terrible secret, too.

Rey wielded her renewed reason and rationality like two cudgels, and she leaned back in the sofa seat, glaring at Rose dubiously. “What _really_ happened to your sister, Rose?” she asked. “Didn’t she go crazy and run away?”

Rose paused. “They gave her what she wanted,” she answered dully. “She did what they asked, and they gave her her heart’s desire.”

_What the fuck does that mean_ , Rey wondered, shaking her head in disbelief. ‘Heart’s desire’—. For some reason, the words brought up the thought of a car receding away from her. Rey blinked twice to clear it. There was no power that could bring _them_ back.

A light glinted in Rose’s eyes, as if she could see exactly into Rey’s mind. “Think about it,” she said. “They could give you what you want, too, Rey.”


End file.
